Er komt geen student of docent in de speciale commissie die het ministerie van Onderwijs gaat adviseren over de prestatieafspraken met afzonderlijke hogescholen en universiteiten.
Reasonable contracts
TU Delft is working to develop at a code of conduct aimed at preventing students from falling victim to unreasonable clauses contained in internship and graduation project contracts. The immediate need for such a code stems from the increasing numbers of contracts signed between students and companies and the fact that – according to TU Delft’s Executive Board – many of these contracts often contain clauses and conditions that are unreasonable for students. An example is clauses pertaining to liability.
Student protests
Thousands of students protested against planned government cuts in higher education and sciences last Friday, but Dutch State Secretary of Education Halbe Zijlstra said the government will not change its plans. Nevertheless, students think their protests were not in vain. “Only last Friday did every Dutch person hear about what is going on,” says Sander Breur, chairman of the Dutch students union LSVb. “More and more people are joining us.” Breur said the LSVb has no concrete plans for new protests, but rather calls on all individual students to start their own campaigns. “With social media everything is possible.”
Part payment
Not all of the insurance money the university received to cover the loss of the former architecture building will be given to the faculty of Architecture. Former architecture faculty dean, Wytze Patijn, told Delta last week that he’s worried by the fact that the Executive Board hasn’t paid out all of the money to repair losses. “This is being pushed forward because of financial problems,” he said. “This is not something to be proud of.” But Hans Krul, secretary of the university, disagrees, saying 110 million euro has already been spent on the architecture faculty and another 50 million will be spent. “Not all of the money goes to Architecture.”
’Love your heart’
TU Delft’s Sports Centre will host a Spinning Marathon on Monday 14 February, starting at 17:00, to benefit the Netherlands Heart Foundation. Professional instructors will be on hand to provide supervise the spinners, who will be able to make use of 125 spinning bikes to ‘spin’ money together for the Netherlands Heart Foundation. All proceeds will go directly to the Netherlands Heart Foundation.
Job losses
Employees at the materials, science and engineering department are resigned to the fact that a sweeping reorganization will soon take place. This is one of the first actions in the university-wide revaluation process. It is expected that 12 to 15 departmental staff positions will be cut. Many however are confident they will hold on to their jobs. “But I’ll only ever be sure when my boss tells me,” says technician Jurriaan van Slingerland. “What I want to know is if I will still have my job in a month?”
Count that
Angered by the amount of his tuition fees, University of Colorado (US) sophomore Nic Ramos paid his entire spring semester tuition – $14,309.51 – with dollar bills, a 50-cent piece and a penny. Ramos told the New York Times: “It’s just an absurd amount of money. I wanted to give the school a different way to look at tuition.” It took three university employees about an hour to count all the money.
Nap time
Research conducted at Germany’s University of Lubeck has found that quick naps can help the brain process and retain information. The researchers claim that taking a short nap after learning information speeds up the process by which information is retained. In one experiment the researchers had two groups of people memorize one set of illustrated cards, and then, after a 40 minute break, learn another set of cards. One group napped during the break, and the other stayed awake. Both groups were then tested on the first set. The group that had napped for 40 minutes performed significantly better, retaining on average 85 percent of the patterns, compared to 60 percent for those who had remained awake. “Reactivation of memories had completely different effects on the state of wakefulness and sleep,” said lead author Susanne Diekelmann, from the University of Lubeck.
Staatssecretaris Zijlstra wil in deze zogeheten ‘reviewcommissie’ mensen die boven de partijen staan, en geen “veredelde lobbyisten”, zei hij vanochtend.
De Landelijke Studenten Vakbond en het Interstedelijk Studenten Overleg hadden daar eerder op aangedrongen. Ze voorspelden dat er weinig terecht zal komen van de prestatieafspraken als studenten, docenten en medezeggenschap er niet bij betrokken worden. Ze hekelden het feit dat de hoofdlijnenakkoorden met de HBO-raad en de VSNU overeenkomsten met alleen bestuurders zijn.
Zijlstra vond dat verwijt onterecht. Het hoofdlijnenakkoord is volgens hem slechts “een handleiding” voor het maken van afspraken met afzonderlijke instellingen; in dat stadium had het nog geen zin om daar studenten bij te betrekken. Wel was hij het met de studentenorganisaties eens dat het belangrijk is dat de medezeggenschapsraden meepraten over de instellingsgebonden afspraken. Hij zal bij de universiteiten en hogescholen benadrukken dat een breed draagvlak belangrijk is.
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